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BEYOND BERGEN: A Jersey City man stole more than $225,000 from his 85-year-old mother’s annuity accounts by pretending to be her. auhtorities charged.
Angel Fontaina, 45, who lives with his mother, siphoned the money between June 2014 and October 2014 by calling the New York Life Insurance Company and pretending to be her, acting New Jersey Attorney General John J. Hoffman said this morning.
The first withdrawal was for $35,000, followed by nine more in amounts ranging from $10,001 to $32,258, he said.
All of the money “was directly deposited into Fontaina’s bank account,” the attorney general said.
New York Life alerted authorities who referred the suspicious withdrawals to the New Jersey Office of the Insurance Fraud Prosecutor, Hoffman said.
“Stealing from vulnerable senior citizens is always a despicable crime,” he said, but Fontaina “stooped even lower by stealing from his own elderly mother.
“These allegations, if proven, would put him among a very low class of criminals.”
Fontaina promised to return the money, but the check bounced, a state grand jury indictment alleges.
Fontaina is charged with theft by decetion, identit theft, forgery and passing bad checks.
Deputy Attorney General Michael Locke presented the case to the grand jury, Hoffman said. Detective Taryn Seidner coordinated the investigation with assistance from Detectives Natalie Brotherston, Matthew Armstrong, and Ryan Kirsh, he added.
Investigators Richard Matarante and Ching Graham from New York Life Insurance Company assisted in the investigation, he said.
ABOVE: Angel Fontaina (PHOTO: Courtesy NJ ATTORNEY GENERAL)
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